Tag: Life

Totally and Utterly Human

Psalm 124:6-7 Blessed be Abba God! … We have escaped like a bird from the snare of the fowler; the snare is broken, and we have escaped. Our help is in the Name of Abba God…

Introduction

Over the course of the past few weeks, we’ve seen Jesus defend his disciples from the offense of unclean hands; it’s not what goes into a person that makes them clean or unclean, but what comes out (it’s a heart issue). We’ve seen Jesus break socio-religio-political boundaries by including an unclean, gentile woman in God’s mission and reign in the world. And last week, we saw Jesus reorient the disciples toward the mission of God and away from the ideologies and dogmas of humanity thriving off notions of human power and might: to be great in the reign of God is to identify with those who have no status or power in your society; in other words it means: to be human. Throughout all these stories, there’s a common thread: discipleship.

According to Mark, to follow Jesus out of the Jordan and to the cross demands a rather radical overhaul of both the believer’s inner and outer life. It’s not about obeying traditionalisms and arcane laws long expired only rendering the outside “clean”; it’s not about boundaries and political lines keeping some in and some out; and it’s not about greatness defined by humanity’s preferential option for status. (These things perpetuate the mythologies of the kingdom of humanity serving only those who are powerful while enslaving those who are not.) Discipleship is about having/receiving a new heart, new mind, new eyes, new ears, new language, and new actions. The disciple of Christ, like Christ, must endure being the epicenter of the conflict of the reign of God being born into the world fracturing the kingdom of humanity and putting things that are upside down, right-side up.

Mark’s Jesus hammers home that discipleship is not/never about dividing lines, in-group and out-group, us v. them; none of that divisionary thinking can exist among the disciples or within each disciple. The mission and reign of God is much bigger (and better) than anyone—yesterday, today, and tomorrow—can or will imagine. The thinking that belongs to the kingdom of humanity is small and divisive; for the disciples, they must think in line with the reign of God: big…cosmically and inclusively big.

Mark 9:38-50

And then John said to [Jesus], “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name and were [unsuccessfully[1]] preventing him because he was not following us.” But Jesus said, “Do not prevent him, for no one—who will do a powerful work in my name—is also able to revile me quickly. For whoever is not against us, [is] for us. For whoever might give you a winecup of water because the name that you are of Christ, truly I say to you, by no means will they lose their reward.” (Mk 9:38-41)

Structurally, there’s no indication in the text that this moment is separated from where we left off last week. Thus, we can assume the same posture: Jesus is down low, the disciples are gathered around him, and a little child is in their midst. And then John speaks, “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name and we were preventing him because he was not following us.” With this statement, it’s clear that the disciples still[2] don’t understand what it means to be disciples in the reign of God and of Christ.[3] The in-group/out-group way of thinking runs deep in the inner (and outer) lives of the disciples. When it comes to Christ, all traditional conceptions of human groupings are called into question.[4] So, the way Jesus replies to the group continues his teaching the disciples what the reign and mission of God (really) is about: It is completely inclusive and it promotes equity. The disciples need a more “welcoming [and open]” mindset[5] toward people who were not following them—which is the real offense for John;[6] anyone who is participating in the reign and mission of God in Christ’s name should not be hindered.[7] In other words, the ability to cast out demons in Jesus’s name[8] (which the Twelve failed at recently[9]) isn’t restricted to some special authority and status[10] the Twelve think they have because of their proximity to Jesus.[11]

Interestingly, when Jesus says, “Do not prevent him, for no one—who will do a powerful work in my name—is also able to revile me quickly. For whoever is not against us, [is] for us. For whoever might give you a winecup of water because the name that you are of Christ, truly I say to you, that by no means they might lose their reward.”, he’s not only broadening the mindset of the disciples, he’s (also) giving three reasons[12] why the disciples need not to be exclusive.

  1. The man is not an enemy; he’s performing exorcism in Jesus’s name thus associating himself with Jesus. Because of this association he will not be able to speak ill quickly of Jesus (et al);[13]
  2. Because of the in-group/out-group mentality expressed in John’s comments to Jesus, Jesus immediately stops cliquishness; it doesn’t belong to the reign of God;[14] and,
  3. The disciples should be kind; simple, kind acts done for those who bear Jesus’sname(i.e. giving a winecup of water) are significant and will be noticed[15] because it is service to Jesus, thus to God. Thus, they are actually with us (ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν) (pace John).[16]

In this way, anything done in the name of Christ and for those who bear Christ’s name is enough;[17] no further demonstration of belonging is needed.[18] In light of this deduction, Jesus exhorts the disciples not to be so prideful[19] that they quickly draw lines in the sand organizing who’s in and who’s out, “They are to be a church, not a sect.”[20]

Jesus then discusses causing one of these little ones (potentially drawing upon the image of the child in their midst and broadening it to those who believe in [Jesus] and can be taken advantage of[21]) to stumble; Jesus emphasizes, from a different angle, the dangers of the aforementioned “cliquishness” and elitism.[22] Each of the four sayings does not really offering anything more novel than the one before it except that the focus moves from causing someone else to stumble to causing one’s own self to stumble. All four sayings work together emphasizing how bad it is to get in the way of God’s Spirit at work in the world to bolster one’s human ideas of exclusion and inequality. Unlike the person who gives a cup of water to the followers, the person who causes someone to stumble deserves the opposite of reward. According to Mark’s Jesus, the one who causes another to stumble will be thrown into Gehenna known for “punishment of the ungodly,”[23] into the flames of the unquenchable fires (in Gehenna the fires burned continually because it was Jerusalem’s garbage dump[24],[25]) and where their worm does not die (ref. to Isaiah[26]). Through these intense images, Jesus exhorts his disciples to be alert and awake because threats lurk outside and within themselves.[27] Therefore, the disciples are exhorted to deal shrewdly with themselves rather than others because—most likely—the problem isn’t the hand, eye, foot, or someone else; it’s the heart[28] and its ability to be held captive to the kingdom of humanity because of pride, a desire for greatness, and status. Rather, the disciples are to be utterly committed to God[29] and God’s reign and mission in the world; this, so they can participate in God’s mission of justice and equity (which is peace[30]) as the beautiful, fragrant, salted sacrifices they are for the well-being of the neighbor and to the glory of God.[31]

Conclusion

Jesus is going to great lengths to make sure his disciples understand that the reign of God is nothing like the kingdom of humanity. God isn’t against humanity, in fact, according to Jesus and Paul Lehmann (quoted last week), God is about humanity, so much so that God transcended God’s self and became human. This was done to elevate humanity above what humanity was/is willing to settle for. And, frankly, that’s the problem with the kingdom of humanity: it regularly settles for less than. Jesus doesn’t want his disciples consumed with notions of greatness, privilege, power, and authority; these things make human beings less human. Jesus wants his disciples to see that their humanity is anchored to their dependence on God by faith in Jesus. The world, for Jesus, needs more simple, vulnerable human beings, not more dictators and despots.

The disciples are to always choose humanity over inhumanity; this is what it means to be dedicated to and participate in God’s mission and revolution of love, life, and liberation. Thus, what keeps the disciples human is taking seriously their role as representatives of God in the world and among their neighbors. Here, our faith in Christ and our dependence on God works itself out in Spirit-filled, loving action toward the neighbor to the glory of God. Remembering whom we follow and whose we are, keeps us dependent and responsible on and to God as well as on and to our neighbor. In this divine economy, there is no elitism and division, but only equity and unity, thus peace and justice. Dorothee Sölle writes,

“The love of which the Gospel speaks is simply the radical intervention of one irreplaceable being for another; an identification which is provisional and which makes its agent dependent. Christ identified himself with God and thereby made himself dependent on God’s attaining identity himself. Anyone who identifies himself with Christ likewise represents God in the world, in suffering and in transitoriness.”[32]

The disciples mistakenly divided by who has authority and who doesn’t, who was following the right dogma and who wasn’t; Jesus set them straight: whoever is representing me in the world through deeds of love, life, and liberation, is representing God and is participating in God’s mission. They who have ears to hear, let them hear.

[1] R. T. France, The Gospel of Mark: A Commentary on the Greek Text, NIGTC, eds. I. Howard Marshall and Donald A. Hagner (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002), 376. “if the imperfect tense of ἐκωλύομεν is correct …it probably indicates an unsuccessful attempt rather than the repeated prohibition of a persistent ‘offender’.”

[2] William C. Placher, Mark, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher. (Louisville: WJK, 2010), 135. “The Twelve make one mistake after another.”

[3] France, Mark, 375. “This little didactic story follows very appropriately form the lesson of vv. 33-37, the call to disciples to be ready to receive those whom they might naturally reject, and the connections is reinforced by the repetition three times in these verse of the phrase ἐπὶ/ἐν τῷ ὀνόματί μου/σου … which was the reason given for receiving the child in v. 37.”

[4] France, Mark, 375. “Where the name of Jesus (i.e., a relationship with him) is concerned, natural human considerations of who is in and who is out will be subverted.”

[5] France, Mark, 376. “The effect of the pericope is to encourage a welcoming openness on the part of Jesus’ disciples which is in stark contrast to the protective exclusiveness more often associated with religious groups, not least within the Christian tradition.”

[6] France, Mark, 377. “The ground of John’s objection was not lack of success, but the use of Jesus’ name outside the group of disciples. The man’s offence is that οὐκ ἀκολουθεῖ ἡμῖν.”

[7] France, Mark, 376. “The man concerned is not a recognized member of the group of disciples, but he does profess to operate in the name of Jesus, and the results of his activity are beneficent. It is this criterion rather than a narrower group identity which the pericope accepts.”

[8] France, Mark, 376-377. “There is some other evidence in the gospels for exorcists outside the immediate circle of Jesus and his disciples…and there are a number of mentioned of exorcism, Jewish and pagan, in roughly contemporary sources…Some of them invoked the name of Jesus (after his death and resurrection), and not always with satisfactory results …This is the only mention of a similar practice during Jesus’ lifetime.”

[9] France, Mark, 376. “To make matters worse, this pericope follows hard on the story of the disciples’ failure in exorcism in 9:14-29. To see an outsider apparently succeeding where they, the chosen agents of Jesus, have failed is doubly distressing.”

[10] France, Mark, 377. What John is looking for is not so much personal allegiance and obedience to Jesus, but membership in the ‘authorised’ circle of his followers. We should perhaps understand ἡμεῖς here as specifically the Twelve, regarded as having an exclusive link with and commission from Jesus, so that other people’s association with him must be through their mediations. Even if such a possessive doctrine is not explicit, it fits John’s restrictive action and explains the terms of Jesus’ response.”

[11] France, Mark, 376. Exorcism as special feature of disciple/the twelve’s calling/authority (given by Jesus), “To find the practice carried out in the name of Jesus by someone unknown to them is therefore a severe blow to the disciples’ sense of identity, and undermines their special status. This issue of status, which underlay the teaching of vv. 33-37, is therefore still in focus.”

[12] France, Mark, 377.

[13] France, Mark, 377. “has associated himself with [Jesus] by using his name, and his choice of that authority, together with the fact of his success, marks him as being on the right side. Such a person cannot in consistency go on to speak as his enemy, and so there is no justification of Jesus’ disciples to oppose him.”

[14] France, Mark, 378. , “The Cliquishness which too easily affects a defined group of people with a sense of mission is among the ‘worldly’ values which must be challenged in the name of the kingdom of God.”

[15] France, Mark, 378. In re “reward” for giving water, “But even so small an act betokens a person’s response to Jesus in the person of his disciples…, and as such will not be unnoticed.”

[16] France, Mark, 378.

[17] Placher, Mark, 135. “The basic direction of Jesus’ response is clear enough—if people are doing good in Jesus’ name, leave them alone.”

[18] France, Mark, 378. “For Mark’s readers it is the title Χριστός which is the touchstone of a persons’ allegiance.”

[19] Placher, Mark, 135. “They are, it turns out, not making a new mistake but the same prideful, competitive ones. If someone is not part of their group, their gang, their tribe, then how dare he claim to do anything in the name of Jesus.”

[20] France, Mark, 378-379. “The three sayings collected in vv. 39-41 thus illustrate in different ways the open boundaries of the kingdom of God, where both committed disciple and sympathetic fellow traveler find their place. The unknown exorcist represents this outer circle, and is to be welcomed as such. There are indeed opponents and ‘outsiders’, as we see repeatedly in the rest of the gospel, but disciples are called on to be cautious in drawing lines of demarcation.

[21] France, Mark, 381. “As Mark’s text stands the question cannot be answered with confidence, but the context as a whole makes it unlikely that the μικροί should be understood only, or even mainly, of children. Disciples of any age are potentially vulnerable to such ‘tripping’.”

[22] France, Mark, 380. “The [following] whole little complex of sayings, like the preceding pericopes, focuses on the demands of discipleship both negatively and positively. The saying thus fit into the overall thrust of this part of the gospel, however artificially they may be linked with one another.”

[23] France, Mark, 381-382. ἡ γέεννα “…a term used in apocalyptic literature for the ultimate place of punishment of the ungodly…it had a clear and well known meaning (because of Matthew’s use}, so that its use alone would communicate adequately.”

[24] France, Mark, 382. Fire “as the agent of judgment and destruction, perhaps exploiting the origin of the word γέεννα in the valley of Hinnom…where the fires of Jerusalem’s refuse dumps burned continuously.”

[25] Placher, Mark, 137. “Gehenna was a valley south of Jerusalem where in ancient times babies were sacrificed to the Canaanite god Moloch. In the reforms under King Josiah (7th century BCE) such practices were brought to an end, and the area became a garbage dump, where refuse was continually smoldering. Gehenna was a horrible place, full of fire, smells, maggots, rats, and things in decay. Its history as a locus of child sacrifice further evokes the context here, where Jesus is singling out for condemnation hose who ‘put a stumbling block before’ or ‘trip up’ any of the ;’little ones who believe in me.’”

[26] France, Mark, 382. Worm statement, “In Isaiah the clause describes the state in which the dead bodies of God’s enemies will be seen, presumably envisaged as decomposing and burning on the battlefield.”

[27] France, Mark, 382-383. “Danger comes to the disciple not only from outside but from within…it is for the reader individually…to determine what aspect of one’s own behavior, tastes, or interests is a potential cause of spiritual downfall, and to take action accordingly.”

[28] Placher, Mark, 138. “But the hypotheticals, while true in themselves, rest on faulty premises. Our hands and feet and eyes do not cause us to sin. We ourselves, our minds, our souls, our wills—whatever language one wants to use, the source of our sin is not a part of us that can be removed with a sharp enough knife. The point of the passage, then, is to say, ‘this is how serous sin is: it would be worth cutting off part of your body to cure it. If only it were that easy. So we have to think even more deeply about sin.”

[29] France, Mark, 384. v. 49 and salt “In this context it speaks of one who follows Jesus as totally dedicated to god’s service, and warns that such dedication will inevitably be costly in terms of personal suffering.”

[30] France, Mark, 385. “The good salt which should characterize disciples consists in …or results in ….peaceful relationships. While salt as a metaphor for peacefulness is in itself an unusual use, in the OT salt symbolises a covenant…”

[31] France, Mark, 384. v. 50 symbolism of “salt” “…in symbolises the beneficial (καλόν) influence of the disciple on society…”

[32] Dorothee Sölle, Christ the Representative: An Essay in Theology after the ‘Death of God,’ translated by David Lewis (London: SCM, 1967), 142. Originally published as, Stellvertretung—Ein Kapitel Theologie nach dem ‘Tode Gottes,’ Kreuz Verlag, 1965. Emphasis, mine.

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Hearts Cleansed First

Psalm 45:1, 7  My heart is stirring with a noble song; let me recite what I have fashioned…my tongue shall be the pen of a skilled writer. Your throne, O God, endures for ever and ever, a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of your reign; you love righteousness and hate iniquity.

Introduction

We just finished discussing the text of the letter to the Ephesians where “alignment” of the inner and outer person was a core thread woven through. For the author of the letter of Ephesians, whom I refer to as Paul, the encounter with God in the event of faith rectifies and substantiates the inner person of the believer with God in the message of what Christ did in his life and death and resurrection, and which is sealed to the believer by the coming of the Holy Spirit. This “spiritual” reality is not enough for Paul, as if just being right with God on the inside is all that matters. According to the logic of Ephesians, for this inner reality to be a real thing it must be/come tangible and that means it must find expression in the temporal realm through the outer person, the body. Faith must (and wants to!) express itself through acts of love. (full stop) In other words, what is on the inside wants to find expression on the outside.

It’s not a pop-psych thing; it’s not a fad or a phase. It’s not “these kids these days!”, it’s a very important concept that must be revisited often in our lives as we grow and mature, change with new information, and after we deconstruct spiritually and intellectually, emotionally and physically. It’s such an important topic that God in Christ Jesus picks up this very concept and discusses it from a different perspective. This time, though, Jesus addresses the discrepancy between empty action toward God because of a heart that clings to human tradition.

Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23

The Pharisees and some of the scribes [from Jerusalem] questioned [Jesus], “Why do your disciples not walk according to the traditions of the priest, but eat bread with dirty hands? And [Jesus] said to them, “Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as is has been written, ‘This people revere me with [their] lips but their heart keeps far off from me. In vain they worship me, teaching the teachings of the precepts of humanity.’ Leaving the commands of God, you hold fast the traditions of humanity.”

Mark opens chapter 7 with the local pharisees coming together with some of the scribes having arrived from Jerusalem.[1] Here we, the audience, are being introduced to the building crisis and intensifying controversy between Jesus and the established leadership of Israel.[2] Not just the local leadership is worried, but the larger leadership is worried; so Jerusalem dispatched a group of scribes to see about this Jesus and his claims and actions.[3] As the two groups (the Pharisees and Jerusalem scribes) come together they take notice that Jesus’s disciples eat bread with unclean hands—that is, unwashed. This small oversight on the part of the disciples sparks pharisaic and scribal attention because, as Mark parenthetically explains to us, for the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they might carefully wash [their] hands, holding fast to the tradition of the priest; and they do not eat unless they ritually wash themselves also from the market… According to Mark, there is a human-made[4] tradition demanding hands (and bodies from the market!) are thoroughly cleansed before consuming food. Even more, anything to do with food should be baptized (washed thoroughly): winecups, pitchers, copper vessels, and couches.The desire is to prevent something external and unclean from contaminating the person on the inside. So, seeing the disciples break such a tradition—running the risk of making themselves unclean—provokes the Pharisees and the scribes to question Jesus, “Why do your disciples not walk according to the traditions of the priests, but eat bread with unclean hands?” As Jesus is pulled into the crisis, this rather small oversight becomes a much bigger deal.[5]

The reason why this small oversight becomes significant is because it marks a very early departure of Jesus’s followers from the traditions of the priests, a departure which will become—over time—more radical.[6] Jesus takes hold of the conversation and moves it away from the banality of tradition-obedience and toward something much more significant: inner-person and outer-person alignment and obedience to God.[7] Jesus begins by calling them hypocrites and then quoting Isaiah, “Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as is has been written, ‘This people revere me with [their] lips but their heart keeps far off from me. In vain they worship me, teaching the teachings of the precepts of humanity.’ And then concludes, “Leaving the commands of God, you hold fast the traditions of humanity.” In other words, Jesus has turned (flipped?) the table on the Pharisees and Jerusalem scribes: it is not my disciples who have left the true tradition of reign of God; it is you who have left God as you cling to traditionalism of the kingdom of humanity.[8] According to Jesus, the existing leadership of the children of Israel have allowed God’s commands to slip away as they grabbed onto the traditions of humanity. They are the ones who are now caught in dissonance: they say they love God but their actions demonstrate that they love their own traditions more. Something is askew.

Then, according to our assigned text, Jesus turns to the crowd, and draws them into the discussion, leaving the Pharisees and Jerusalem scribes to their own thoughts, “Listen to me all [of you] and understand, nothing from outside of a person is able to make them unclean by entering into them. Rather, it is that which proceeds out of/is spoken by a person which makes the person unclean. Jesus addresses the crowd because what is at stake exceeds just washing one’s hands according to the traditions of human beings; what is at stake is one’s orientation toward God (inward) and, thus, one’s orientation toward the neighbor (outward).[9] Building from the Isaiah quotation, Jesus recenters the state of the inner person (the heart) as the most important thing, as the seat of what defiles or does not defile a person.[10] It’s not a dirty pitcher or dirty hands that makes one unclean, it’s what is produced from the heart and finds its way out that makes someone unclean. Thus, why Jesus then says, For it is from within the heart of the person that the bad reasonings bursts forth….all these wicked things burst forth from within and pollute the person. In other words, you can be as ritually pure according to tradition as you want—avoiding this or that thing, person, or deed—but if your heart is still far from God then none of it matters because you are still unclean and exposes that you’ve never been thoroughly washed (baptized), from head to toe. [11] You can say you are worshipping God and love God all you want, but your actions (toward your neighbor) will speak otherwise because what’s on the inside always wants to find expression on the outside. For Mark’s Jesus, clinging to traditionalisms in the name of God reveal the heart that is turned away from the neighbor because it cannot see the oppression and marginalization being imposed on the people who are just trying to live to the best of their ability. In other words, for Jesus, the Pharisees and the scribes from Jerusalem have forsaken the mission of the reign of God and have invested in the tyranny of the kingdom of humanity; God’s divine revolution of love, life, and liberation is being ignored (at best) and hindered (at worst).

Conclusion

According to Mark’s Jesus, our hearts must first be made right before we can begin to align the outer person with the inner person in a way that conforms with God’s will and the mission of the reign of God. Our hearts are repeatedly tempted to return to the ways of the kingdom of humanity, and we find ourselves lured to (re)draw lines of division between the “acceptable” and “unacceptable,” the “good” and the “bad,” the “clean” and the “unclean.”[12] (Remember, according to Ephesians, humans love a good dividing wall and God loves unity.) So, Mark’s Jesus is asking us—challenging us, inviting us[13]—to reevaluate and take stock of these tendencies and to align our bodily expressions to our faith, our auditory words to God’s Word residing in our hearts, to recenter in our lives and loves those who have been otherwise left out and oppressed by the dominant culture of the kingdom of humanity (people of color, queer people, indigenous people, people who are disabled, our elders, women, etc.). We must take a deep, hard look at the ways we’ve participated in forcing obedience to external conformity on those who look different from us, act different from us, and who walk through the world differently from us, and really see how we have refused to let them be who they are inside and out, how we have denied their bodies, their stories, and their religions in the world. Our histories expose that our hearts have been far from God—calcified, cold, and dead—even though we have convinced ourselves we acted and proclaimed in God’s will and name! We must take our inner and outer alignment seriously—for Jesus is speaking to us and not “them out there” who are getting it wrong according to our books. We must begin to realize we’ve conflated the goals of our human empire for the mission of the reign of God. And it is “We” because we are being addressed, those who claim to represent God by bearing Christ’s name into the world and those who claim to participate in God’s mission of divine revolution of life, love, and liberation in the world by the leading of the Spirit.

[1] R. T. France, The Gospel of Mark: A Commentary on the Greek Text, NIGTC, eds. I. Howard Marshall and Donald A. Hagner (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002), 276. “…not the local scribal leadership but…a delegation ἀπὸ Ἱεροσολύμων.”

[2] France, Mark, 276. “With the beginning of chapter 7 we return to a situation of controversy and of teaching, the two closely woven together. Opposition and rejection have of course been recurrent themes in the Galilean ministry so far, but with this new pericope the tension between Jesus and the religious leadership rises to a new of mutual repudiation, and Jesus deliberately fuels the fire with a more radical pronouncement even than his controversial comments on the sabbath (vv. 15, 19).”

[3] France, Mark, 280. “The fact that in both instances they are described as having arrived …from Jerusalem probably indicates that they have come specially to investigate and/or to dispute with Jesus.”

[4] France, Mark, 280. “…it is the behaviour of Jesus’ disciples rather than his own actions which provides the point of dispute…The issue this time…is not one of obedience to the OT laws, but of rules subsequently developed in Pharisaic circles. While no doubt it could normally be expected that hands would be washed before a meal for hygienic reasons (since food was often taken from a common dish), the only hand washing required in the OT for purposes of ritual purity is that of priests before offering sacrifice…The extension o this principle to the eating of ordinary food and to Jewish people other than priests, was a matter of scribal development, and it is uncertain how far it had progressed by the time of Jesus.”

[5] France, Mark, 277. “While the issue raised by the scribes in v. 2 is at the relatively inoffensive level of ritual washing before meals (a matter on which Jews themselves held different views), by his pronouncement in v. 15 Jesus deliberately widens the discussion to include this ritual separation which constituted one of the ‘badges’ of Jewish national identity.”

[6] France, Mark, 277. The hand washing is smallish but ends up being the catalyst for the “stark polarisation of views which must pit Jesus’ new teaching irrevocably against current religious orthodoxy, and which will, in the fulness of time, lead the community of his followers outside the confines of traditional Judaism altogether.”

[7] France, Mark, 283. “Jesus’ response will therefore focus on this more fundamental issue of the relative authority of tradition as such as a guide to the will of God, rather than on the provenance of the particular tradition in question.”

[8] France, Mark, 285. “The basic charge is economically expressed by means of three contrasting pairs of words: ἀφέντες…κρατεῖτε; ἐντολὴν…παράδοσιν; θεοῦ…ἀνθρώπων. The fundamental contrast is the last—true religion is focused on God, not a merely human activity. What comes from God has the authoritative character of ἐντολή, which requires obedience; what comes from human authority is merely παράδοσις, which may or may not be of value in itself, but cannot have the same mandatory character. Yet they have held fast to the latter, while allowing the former to go by default.”

[9] France, Mark, 286. “Indeed, the Pharisees and scribes are not mentioned again; their accusation has been rebutted, and now Jesus takes the imitative in raising publicly a much more fundamental issue of purity which goes far beyond the limited question of the validity of the scribal rules for hand washing. No specific regulation is now in view, but rather the basic principle of defilement by means of external contacts which underlies all the purity laws of the To and of scribal tradition.”

[10] France, Mark, 291. “Unlike the things which do not defile because they do not make contact with the καρδία, the really defiling things are those which actually originate in the καρδία.”[10] The seat of thought and will

[11] William C. Placher, Mark, Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible, eds Amy Plantinga Pauw and William C. Placher. (Louisville: WJK, 2010), 102. “The challenge is not to particular details of traditional purity laws but to the whole idea that ‘purity’ means keeping your distance from unclean persons, things, and types of food.”

[12] Placher, Mark, 103. “Worry about your own attitudes and behavior, not how you might look to others if they see you associating with the wrong people. There are no ‘wrong people’ when it comes to those Christians should care about.”

[13] Placher, Mark, 104. “Jesus invites us to let all our respectability be burned away so that nothing will distinguish us from the freaks and lunatics, and only thus to enter his reign.”

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Kate Hanch’s “Storied Witness”

Kate Hanch, Storied Witness: The Theology of Black Women Preachers in 19th-Century America, Minneapolis, Fortress, 2022.

Kate Hanch’s text, Storied Witness, provides crucial information about women, three black women preachers, who would otherwise go undetected and radically underquoted by mainstream theology. Hanch centers the voices of Zilpha Elaw, Julia Foote, and Sojourner Truth and demonstrates that these three humble and powerful women must be included in regular discourse about God and God’s work in the world. For mainstream theology, Hanch’s book is a challenge: can we broaden the scope of whom we turn to gather our theological education and research? I believe Hanch’s answer is not only a vibrant and bold “Yes!” but also “We must!” If theology—rather, good theology, or “better theology,” referring to Hanna Reichel’s work in “After Method”—is going to resist the temptation to obsolescence and survive this rampant era of welcome deconstruction, then theologians and other servants of “words about God” *must*find new pathways to talk about God’s divine revolution of love, life, and liberation in the world for the wellbeing of God’s beloved.

The book is structured so that Elaw, Foote, and Truth all get their own spotlight. In addition to this clear structure, Hanch draws out from each essential biblical truths about God and about Christian praxis. Reading about Zipha Elaw, the reader also learns the old truth often forgotten that the Spirit of God is no respecter or persons but calls and rejuvenates the inner power to proclaim God’s good news of Christ’s life and work in liberating the captives. Yet, the reader isn’t a mere spectator here: clearly, if you are reading along as Hanch is deftly waling you through Elaw’s life and preaching, then you, too, are being addressed by God through Elaw and thus being summoned into the light of Christ to see and hear the cries of those still captive. The same goes for the chapters on Julia Foote and Sojourner Truth: the reader is unable to claim ignorance once she’s done reading these chapters, she has been solicited into becoming aware of her “bodied” “power” (Foote) and her need to be a witness to God and God’s work in Christ and God’s work in her by the power of the Holy Spirit (Truth). Essentially, Hanch puts her reader—especially her white reader—on the hook chapter after chapter.

The last chapter, “Black Women Preachers as Exemplars of a Prophetic Pastoral Theology,” weaves together the lives of these three prophetic and pastoral preachers and drives home without hesitation how robust and living theology streams forth from the lips of Elaw, Foote, and Truth. In essence, what Hanch has done in this last chapter was give her reader a “cheat sheet,” if you will, on how to do theology better with voices that are not mainlined—as in, not cis-het-white men. She lays out the ways that the previous structure of the book is limiting because one can’t pigeonhole these women into a single theme because they are each doing theology, they are each speaking about a very big God who did a big thing in Christ and by the power of the Holy Spirit. Hanch builds many theology ideas around and out of the work of Elaw, Foote, and Truth; thus, Hanch, exhorts her reader to the same. Here, Hanch directs her reader to really see—in case they missed it in the pages before—how the reader’s theology can grow by engaging the work of these women, using them as her guide, and affirming the presence of the divine Spirit in their words and works without recourse to making sure they align to the voices of cis-het-white men from ages past and limited/specific encounter with God.

The one thing I was left wondering was about Hanch’s use of “bodied” and “powered.” Very creative uses of these words because I want to say “embodied” and “empowered,” as in, being given the power and the bodiedness. But maybe that’s Hanch’s point. The power and the bodiedness of these three women wasn’t to be *given* to them as if earned or merited by being good or doing well according to an earthly authority. Rather, these women took the place and occupied the space because they had their *own* power and their *own* beautiful bodies and used both because the source of that power and bodiedness is God in and of God’s self; that was all the permission Elaw, Foote, and truth needed. To my reader, it begs the question, doesn’t it?

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Walking by Faith

Psalm 20:1-2, 7 May Abba God answer you in the day of trouble, the Name of the God of Jacob defend you; send you help from God’s holy place and strengthen you out of Zion; Some put their trust in chariots and some in horses, but we will call upon the Name of our Abba God.

Introduction

“What now?” is the controlling question for this season of Pentecost. Paul is our faithful guide to answer this question. We’ve seen Paul exhort the Corinthians toward full dependence on God: dependence on the presence of God in the incarnate word of God and the indwelling of the Spirit of God. In whom does the Spirit of God indwell? The believers, the simple, inexpensive, breakable vessels. God trusts these “jars of clay” with God’s most precious treasure: God’s Word, the Proclamation of Christ, the bringing of God’s love, life, and liberation (in word and deed) to the beloved.

Last week we added another question to consider: “Will they?” Will those human beings deprived of God’s love, life, and liberation know we are Christians by our love? Paul moved his Corinthians—and us—toward the reality that these breakable vessels carrying God’s treasure are the epicenter of the comingling of the spiritual and temporal realms, through whom and with whom God works out God’s mission and divine revolution. This means that we must fix our gaze on that which cannot be perceived because it will never disappoint because it will never pass away. To fix our gaze on that which can be perceived will always disappoint because it will always pass away. And, For Paul, faith leads to acting/speaking into the kingdom of humanity the things that participate in the reign of God and in God’s mission and revolution of love, life, and liberation for the unloved, nearly dying, and the captive. “We, we believe, therefore we, we speak”; and we, we see, so we act. It is the Holy Spirit inspired believer who is the one who has eyes so fixed on that which cannot be perceived that they can also see that what can be perceived—within the temporal realm—fails the neighbor and hinders God’s revolution of love, life, and liberation from reaching them; and in seeing, they act/speak to open up the divine floodgates letting love, life, and liberation flow like water to the parched.

But that’s not all…there’s more to navigate in the collision of the temporal and spiritual realms.

2 Corinthians 5:6-10, 14-17

For the love of Christ controls us because we are convinced that one died on behalf of all people therefore, all people died. And he died on behalf of all people so that the one who lives might no longer live for themselves but for the one who died on behalf of all people and the one who was raised. So then, from now on we, we have perceived and continue to perceive no one according to the flesh. … So then, if anyone [is] in Christ, [they are a] new creation! The old things passed away; behold! [everything] has become new! (2 Cor. 5:14-16a, 17)

Paul begins by tightening the tension of the spiritual and temporal realities for the believer: being confident at all times because we perceive while we are at home in the body we are away from home with the Lord—we walk by faith and not by visible form—we are confident and would rather be away from home in the body and be at home with the Lord (vv. 6-8). None of this is pitting the body (the σῶμα) against the spirit (the πνεῦμα).[1]  And, none of this denies that Christ is in the believer and the believer is in Christ by the presence of the Spirit.[2] What is happening is this: there’s an emphasis on walking by faith and not by visible forms. As we are here in the body, we are not able to walk bodily with Christ so we must (for now) walk in Christ by walking in both the spiritual and temporal realm.[3] In other words, as a whole person (spirit and body) we have one foot in the spiritual realm and one foot in the temporal realm while knowing all that we see is not all that there is; this means being caught up in and confronted by both the divine pathos and human antipathy perceiving what should be and what is not.[4],[5]

So, v. 9’s exhortation makes sense:[6] Therefore we eagerly strive –whether being at home or being away from home—to be well pleasing to Christ! In other words, this tension and paradox of earthly, Christian existence doesn’t mean Paul should check-out, rather it means he should really check-in because while Paul is not bodily with Christ he is with Christ by faith and Christ is with him; where Paul goes, there Christ goes, too.[7] Thus, Paul will expend himself, lose everything on behalf of the divine word of Christ and the divine deeds of love for the captives.[8] Paul will strive to do well in the mortal body so to appear before the tribunal of Christ and may receive back what has been lost because of what was accomplished—whether good or bad—in/by the body. This is not about heaven or hell, but about assessing works and their recompense; it’s about reward not status.[9] I’m placing emphasis in this thought on the verb translated as “may receive back what has been lost.” This verb highlights that what was lost bodily while participating in God’s mission and identifying with the beloved of God (the captive, the one fighting for their life and love in the world) will be paid back. I could say it another way: it is the one who picks up their cross to follow Christ who will find their life. What goes out and into the world on behalf of the neighbor, comes back when standing face to face with Christ.

Then, Paul focuses on Christ: one’s love for Christ and Christ’s love for all people[10] which motivates Christian activity in the world.[11] For the love of Christ controls us because we are convinced that one died on behalf of all people’ therefore, all people died.  It is the love of Christ shown through the cross that solicits the believer’s identification with Christ. Thus, as Christ’s death exposes the believer for who they are (sinner) the exposed one dies as Christ died.[12] Yet, it’s not only about identifying with Christ’s death, but also identifying with whom Christ identified: the oppressed, the hungry, the suffering, the sorrowful, the state disgraced and disenfranchised,[13] And he died on behalf of all people so that the one who live might no longer live for themselves but for the one who died on behalf of all people and the one who was raised. To follow Christ means to live and die as Christ did for the beloved of God—spiritually and temporally if necessary.

But not just identifying with Christ’s death but with Christ’s resurrected life and being recreated by faith. Thus, Paul can say, So then, from now on we, we have perceived and continue to perceive no one according to the flesh. … if anyone [is] in Christ, [they are a] new creation! The old things passed away; behold! [everything] has become new! The liberation of the believer by faith in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit is liberation into and for the well-being of the world, the neighbor, especially for those who are fighting to live, to love, to be liberated and all of it to the glory of God.[14] This recreation demands a change of address; the believer may live in the kingdom of humanity but her address is of the reign of God.[15] Thus, she has no excuse here according to Paul: not only does she walk by faith, she operates in the world by faith, refusing to judge anyone according to the flesh.[16],[17] She is a totally new creation, seeing the world differently, operating in the world differently, speaking into the world differently finding the source of her motivation in the word of God to the Glory of God.[18]

Conclusion

Christ came into the world not for Christ’s self, but for the world, for the beloved, for the neighbor, for you. And as those who have been adopted into God by faith in Christ and by the power of the Holy Spirit—living in, with, and among you—you are now grafted into and solicited to participate in God’s mission and revolution in the world to make this world better, to arrest if from the hands of those who are dead set on destroying it for their own gain, power, and ego. To walk by faith is to see by faith and if to see by faith, to speak by faith, act by faith, and to do it all as breakable vessels fully dependent on God carrying the valuable treasure of God’s love, life, and liberation within ourselves. To walk by faith is to walk with one foot always in the temporal realm and one foot in the spiritual realm, to be aware that you are, by faith, the epicenter of human and divine activity in the world to the glory of God and the well-being of the neighbor.

(This does not mean creating a calcified and static Christian nation-state, because the spiritual realm and the temporal realm can never be one and the same realm this side of Christ’s coming again; they always exist distinctly and alongside each other. The spiritual realm and its believers—whoever they are—are always there to highlight how the kingdoms of humanity fail not only other human beings but also God’s mission and revolution of love, life, and liberation in the world. Every day believers are new creations, letting that which is no longer helpful to human and cosmic thriving to slip away and, like midwives, ushering in that which is helpful to human and cosmic thriving. Thus, the believer must always liberated from the temporal realm by the spiritual realm by faith and by being a new creature everyday we can see that where there is not love we must bring love, where there is not life we must bring life, where there is not liberation we must bring liberation.)

[1] Harris, Second Corinthians, 395. “Paul has in mind the physical body as the locus of human existence on earth, the frail and mortal σῶμα ψυχικόν. His thought here is neither dualistic…nor derogatory…He is affirming that to be living on earth in a physical body inevitably means distance—indeed exile—from the risen Lord, who lives in heaven in a spiritual body.”

[2] Harris, Second Corinthians, 397-398. “The separation, Paul answers, is relative not absolute: though absent from sight, the Lord is present to faith, yet it is not until he is present also to sight that Christian existence will reach its true goal of consummated fellowship with him.”

[3] Harris, Second Corinthians, 396. “To be ἐν Χριστῷ does not yet mean to be σὺν Χριστῷ (Phil. 1:23). Unlike Christ, Paul had his residence on earth, not heaven, but he recognized that his true home, his ultimate residence, was πρὸς τὸν κύριον (v.8); in this sense he was an exile, absent from his home with the Lord…And if an exile, also a pilgrim (cf. περιπατοῦμεν, v.7). But as well as regarding his separation from Christ as ‘spatial,’ Paul may he viewed it as ‘somatic.’ It is not simply a case of Christ’s being ‘there’ and Christians’ being ‘here’; until Christians have doffed their earthly bodies and donned their heavenly, they are separated from their Lord by the difference between two modes of being, the σῶμα ψυχικόν and the σῶμα πνευματικόν.”

[4] Harris, Second Corinthians, 399. “…to lead a life of faith is to see only baffling, mirrored reflections of reality and to have incomplete knowledge…”

[5] Harris, Second Corinthians, 399. “…living in the realm of faith is indistinguishable from hoping for what is still unseen…”

[6] Harris, Second Corinthians, 404. “Paul’s constant ambition to know Christ’s approval (v. 9) was the direct consequence or obvious corollary of his awareness that death would terminate his absence form Christ and inaugurate a περιπατεῖν διὰ εἶδους πρὸς τὸν κῦριον (vv. 6-8). To entertain the hope of person-to-person communion with Christ after death (v. 8b) inevitably and naturally prompted the aspiration of gaining acceptance in his eyes before and after death.”

[7] Harris, Second Corinthians, 399. “‘Where the Spirit is, there is expectation.’ As long as Paul was required to ‘walk in the realm of faith,’ he was distant from the Lord and yet possessed of the pledge of the Spirit that a ‘walking in the realm of sight’ was to follow.”

[8] Harris, Second Corinthians, 405. “Vv. 8-10 well illustrate the interrelatedness of eschatology and ethics. Paul’s constant ambition to gain Christ’s approval (v. 9) was prompted by two facts relating to the future of his destiny of dwelling with the Lord (v. 8) and his coming accountability to Christ (v. 10).”

[9] Harris, Second Corinthians, 409. “Since, then, the tribunal of Christ is concerned with assessment of works, not the determination of destiny, it will be apparent that the Pauline concepts of justification on the basis of faith and recompense in accordance with works may be complementary. Not status but reward is determined ἔμπροσθεν τοῦ βήατος τοῦ Χριστοῦ, for justification as the acquisition of a right standing before God anticipates the verdict of the Last Judgment.”

[10] Harris, Second Corinthians, 421. “When Christ died, he was acting both on behalf of and in the place of all human beings.”

[11] Harris, Second Corinthians, 419. “No one doubts that believers’ love for Christ motivates their actions, but here Paul is concentrating on an earlier stage of motivation, namely the love shown by Christ in dying for humankind.”

[12] Harris, Second Corinthians, 421. “When Christ died, all died; what is more, his death involved their death.”

[13] Harris, Second Corinthians, 422. “The intended result of the death of Christ was the Christian’s renunciation of self-seeking and self-pleasing and the pursuit of a Christ-centered life filled with action for the benefit of others, as was Christ’s life…”

[14] Harris, Second Corinthians, 426. “…reflects a distinctive Christian outlook.”

[15] Harris, Second Corinthians, 423. “…‘for Paul, freedom means transfer from one dominion to another: from law to grace (Ro . 6:14) from sin to righteousness (Rom. 6:18), from death to life (Rom. 6:21-23), from flesh to Spirit (Rom. 8:4ff); or, as he puts it here, from self to Christ…’”

[16] Harris, Second Corinthians, 427. “Paul is affirming that with the advent of the era of salvation in Christ, and eve since his own conversion to Christ, he has ceased making superficial, mechanical judgments about other people on the basis of outward appearances—such as national origin, social status, intellectual capability, physical attribute, or even charismatic endowment and pneumatic displace…”

[17] Harris, Second Corinthians, 429. “…Paul is rejecting (in v. 16a) any assessment of human beings that is based on the human or worldly preoccupation with externals.”

[18] Harris, Second Corinthians, 434. “When a person becomes a Christian, he or she experiences a total restructuring of life that alters its whole fabric—thinking, feeling, willing, and acting. Anyone who is ‘in Christ’ is ‘Under new Management’ and has ‘Altered Priorities Ahead,’ to use the wording sometimes found in shop windows and …on roads.”

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Will They Know?

Psalm 138:8-9 Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you keep me safe; you stretch forth your hand against the fury of my enemies; your right hand shall save me. God will make good God’s purpose for me; Abba God, your love endures for ever; do not abandon the works of your hands.

Introduction

Last week we touched on a few things. First, “What now?” Now that we find ourselves walking in the steps of the disciples, we are also faced with the same question they had, “What now?” And in this way we share in that same moment even though our place in history is very different; the question and the situation overlaps with similarity: we are without Jesus, just as they were; we are with the Holy Spirit, just as they were; we are called to participate in God’s revolution of love, life, and liberation in the world for the beloved, just as they were. Moving forward is precarious business and makes this time in our liturgical calendar EXTRAordinary rather than just ordinary.

Paul is our faithful guide through these beginning steps; for he knows what it’s like to be upended by Christ and brought to life by the Holy Spirit to the glory of God. So, second, Paul brought us into the necessity of full dependence on God, God’s word, and God’s spirit. We are exhorted to proclaim Jesus Christ (died, raised, and ascended) and not our own dogmas; this leads us to elevate the neighbor as the principal concern in our life (individually and together). To proclaim Christ into the world is to love the neighbor because to love the neighbor is to proclaim Christ because Christ is brought to the neighbor through our words and deeds (which both fuel proclamation). According to Paul, we must see Christ in our neighbor and our neighbor in Christ, thus, to love Christ is to love the neighbor and to proclaim Christ is to bring Christ closer to the neighbor whom Christ loves.

And, third, we do this as cheap, breakable vessels charged to carry within ourselves the very treasure of God: God’s self and God’s word. We are no longer our own, but we are Christ’s and if Christ’s than our neighbor’s and the world’s. We serve God and God’s mission in the world as vessels easily fractured but never destroyed because God’s strength is made known in our weakness; that makes us very strong.

But Paul isn’t finished with his “jars of clay”; there’s more to the story, there’s more to the answer to “What now?”

2 Corinthians 4:13-5:1

Therefore, we are not growing weary, rather even though our outer humanity is being utterly destroyed, yet our inner [humanity] is being made new day after day. For our immediate, light tribulation according to excellence is being worked out for us toward the surpassing eternal weight of glory, fixing our gaze not on the things that are perceived but [on] the things which cannot be perceived, for the things that can be perceived [are] temporary, but the things that cannot be perceived [are] eternal]. (2 Cor. 4:16-18)

Paul shifts the Corinthian’s attention away from the material to the spiritual. He does this in part because he is rendering his suffering, his struggle, his pain and turmoil as movement of the spiritual realm within the temporal realm. Paul’s faith places a demand on his body to speak (‘I believed therefore I spoke,’ also we, we believe, therefore we also speak (v.13). Faith leads to proclamation; love leads to deeds… there’s no way around it either for Paul or for scripture.[1],[2] Thus, if for Paul then for the disciples, too.

Pain and toil, tumult and suffering are going to come to those who move through the world turning the material world upside and bringing into reality the spiritual world; for Paul to really love God is to lead the lover through the torment of loving the neighbor in the world because this love of God which is love of neighbor is going to demand from the lover acts and words of love (the good news) for the beloved.[3] What Paul is talking about here are deeds and words that go beyond mere acts of charity and niceness because neither of those things necessitates the depth of love of God thus of God’s beloved (the neighbor). You can do those things without love and without gaining the attention of the system (because. The system isn’t going to create much fuss about it because it isn’t impacted by charity or niceness). But to really love God and God’s beloved in the world is to dare to transgress the red-lined boundaries drawn by the rulers of the kingdom of humanity forcing most to be out and few (who qualify) to be in. To love God and God’s beloved is to call sham on the inherent tendencies of the kingdom of humanity that gains power from us-ing and them-ing, friend-ing and foe-ing, including and excluding.

To step over these boundaries, to proclaim God’s love into this oppression and marginalization, is to draw radical attention to yourself and thus draw unto your mortal body the pain and suffering delivered by the kings of this material world. To conjure up the spiritual realm into the temporal realm is to up-end and un-do all that the kingdom of humanity values and esteems and will bring the heat down upon you. But this is why Paul then goes on to stress that he will be raised with Christ—for we know that the one who raised Jesus and us with Jesus will raise and will place [us] with you (v. 14). For Paul, the promised resurrection with Christ made him bolder and more active not smugger and more complacent in his future. It made him put everything on the line and not store it all up like grain in silos. He knew that no matter what happened to this outer body, this material body, there was (for him and all believers) a new body with Christ and with the community.[4] Therefore there was no reason to hold back and there was no reason for the Corinthian community to be worried because all the suffering and pain because of all things (Paul’s preaching and doing)[5] is for their benefit[6] and to the glory of God so that God’s grace and God’s love is abounding yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

This is why Paul then moves to speak of inner and outer humanity; these are not two separate entities vying for importance, rather Paul is speaking about the one person from two different viewpoints: the outer viewpoint (the material perspective: morality, praxis)[7] and the inner viewpoint (from the spiritual perspective: new creation).[8] In other words, Paul is employing a type of merism here, using two extreme points to speak of a whole, and in this case, he’s speaking of the whole person. And even if the material body, the outer humanity, is diminishing—through trial and tumult, pain and suffering, persecution and threat—the spiritual body, the inner humanity is not diminishing because nothing can steal from God’s glory and grace made manifest in the believer’s new creation.[9] And so Paul can exhort the Corinthian believers to fix their gaze on things that cannot be perceived rather than things that can be perceived because whatever is perceived is that which is passing away, temporal, temporary and will disappoint time and time again because it always goes away. Whether it is wealth, security, comfort, lack of trouble, things of this ilk are all based on the temporal, a material reality that is fleeting, and they will return to dust. Thus, to focus on Christ, press into God’s word, and rely fully on God’s Spirit is to fix the gaze on things that cannot be perceived and thus can never (ever!) pass away because they are of God and thus of the spiritual realm and are the things of eternity, never passing away thus a lasting reality rather than a temporary one.[10] Thus, as Paul fixes his own gaze on things not perceived, he exhorts the Corinthians to follow suit.[11]

Conclusion

So, Paul moves us closer to answering the question proposed by this ecclesiastical EXTRAordinary time: “What now?” Both the Christian and the Christian community will live in the tension of being in the world but not of the world, to quote John’s Jesus. We are exhorted to suspend disbelief especially when everything seems to be pointing to and advocating for death, indifference, and captivity. We must dare to step into the gap, the void, into the margins and fringe to carry our proclamation (in word and deed) of God’s good news and participate in God’s long esteemed mission and revolution in the world to bring divine love, life, and liberation to the beloved. To adhere to this tension and daring to enter in will render you, the believer, the epicenter of the material realm and the spiritual realm, where both collide and coalesce. For, according to Paul, it is the believer who can—with eyes fixed on that which cannot be seen—call out and expose that which is perceived to be false, as a sham, as a mocking of life by death, of love by indifference, of liberation by captivity.

Today we sing, “They will know we are Christians by our love.” So, part of answering “What now?” is honestly asking, “Will they?”

[1] Murray J. Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians: A Commentary on the Greek Text, NIGTC, eds. I Howard Marshall and Donald A Hagner (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005), 351. “Although suffering is part and parcel of the apostolic ministry, faith in God and in the gospel cannot but lead to the proclamation of the good news the open declaration of the truth (v. 2b).”

[2] Harris, Second Corinthians, 351. “…Paul views himself as sharing ‘the same spirit of faith’ as was expressed by the psalmist when he said ‘I believe, and therefore I spoke.’”

[3] Harris, Second Corinthians, 352. “…Paul is clearly focusing on the principle ‘faith leads to speech’ or ‘believing is the ground…for speaking.’ As the principle applies to his case, Paul is affirming that in spite of the inroads of θάνατος in his life (v. 12a), his unswerving belief in God and in the gospel as God’s powerful instrument to bring salvation to everyone who has faith…made it natural and necessary for him to declare (λαλεῖν) the good news.”

[4] Harris, Second Corinthians, 353. “For Paul, Christ’s resurrection formed the guarantee of believers’ resurrection, which is the probable significance of the phrase σὺν Ἰησοῦ.”

[5] Harris, Second Corinthians, 356. Τὰ πάντα “refers to all that Paul does and that happens to him, but in particular his preaching (vv. 2-3, 5, 7) and his suffering (vv. 8-12).”

[6] Harris, Second Corinthians, 356. “The apostle reminds his converts that all aspects of his life promote not his own good but theirs—a sentiment already expressed…”

[7] Harris, Second Corinthians, 360. “He is contemplating his total existence from two contrasting viewpoints. The ‘outer self’ is the whole person from the standpoint of one’s ‘creaturely mortality,’ the physical aspect of the person.”

[8] Harris, Second Corinthians, 360. “The ‘inner self’ is …the whole person as a ‘new creation’ (5:17) or a ‘new person’ (Col. 3:9-10), ‘the renewed being of the Christian,’ the spiritual aspect of the believer.”

[9] Harris, Second Corinthians, 363. “…[Paul] had this paradoxical attitude toward affliction because his spiritual sights were set on the δόξα that could not be seen but was continuing to be produced.”

[10] Harris, Second Corinthians, 364. “Paul had not fixed his gaze exclusively on τὰ μὴ βλεπόμεν. Rather, he is affirming that his affections were on the ‘the realm above’…on lasting realities—some future, but others already present although still be fully realized.”

[11] Harris, Second Corinthians, 365. “Christians should be characterized by a fixation on invisible, enteral realities. Paradoxically, their eyes are riveted on what cannot be seen. The world of sense does not determine their outlook and action.”

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Joining Our Voices to the Divine Symphony

Psalm 1:1a, 2-3 Happy are they who have not walked in the counsel of the wicked…Their delight is in the law of Abba God, and they meditate on that law day and night. They are like trees planted by streams of water, bearing fruit in due season, with leaves that do not wither; everything they do shall prosper.

Introduction

The church visible is a specific community of human beings with a specific summons in the world; and as the church invisible it is called to be in the world but not of the world because its fabric and substance is cultivated from and of divine spiritual essence. People both make and do not make the church. There is no church without the people (visible), but the church is not restricted to a certain group of people (invisible). Every church is called to participate as a locus of the divine revolution of love, life, and liberation in the world and in this way the church visible partakes of the long surging presence of the church invisible. We as a visible church are yoked to the larger invisible church extending through time, and we find our place in this history as we are, where we are holding space for God to show up and work through us as a site of divine revolution of love, life, and liberation.

In this way, the church cannot find its comfort in the material realm, but rather it must find it in God through dependence on Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit. It’s from this posture that the church can bring comfort into the world. Thus, the metrics of success offered by the world fall flat when judging the church; it is not always the largest, the wealthiest, and the building with the most things that is the one most closely aligned to the reign of God. To be in the world and of the world is to relinquish the message of Christ for the message of the world and therein stifle the life-giving proclamation of Christ crucified and raised; a message that breaks in and interrupts the messages of the world. To sacrifice the message of Christ for an acceptable message according to the world is to sacrifice a true message of a substantial and enduring comfort for the saccharine and temporary comfort of the world.

But the church, which is built from the dust of the ground, is animated by and dependent on the breath of God, the Word of God, the Spirit of God found in the encounter with God in the event of faith in Christ. The church is to be in the world and not of the world because the world and its inhabitants need a good word, a new word, a word of love, life, and liberation, one they didn’t come up with themselves.

John 17:6-19

Jesus prayed…“I am no longer in the cosmos and they, they are in the cosmos, and I, I come to you. Holy Elder, take care of them in your name which you have given to me, so that they are one just as we [, we are one]. When I was with them I, I was taking care of them in your name which you have given to me, and I guarded [them] and not one of them was lost if not the son of destruction…I, I have given to them your word, and the cosmos detested them, because they are not of the cosmos just as I, I am not of the cosmos.” (Jn 17:11-12b, 14)

This is the “Farewell Prayer.” Here, Jesus prays for his disciples, the ones he called to himself and thus to God and the same ones he is leaving. Jesus called each one by name and ushered them into the reality of God; they have been given new eyes to see, new ears to hear and thus they are now no longer of the world even though they are in it. The goal of the prayer is to make sure that the disciples whom Jesus is leaving behind in the world will remain in the truth that is God’s self-disclosure revealed by Christ (vv. 17, 19), and not fall prey to the oppression and hatred of the world thus cease remaining in Christ to seek comfort in the world.[1]

A thread that runs through the prayer is “oneness.” This oneness is part of the truth of God revealed in Christ: Jesus and God are one thus those who encounter Jesus encounter God; where Jesus goes, God goes, too.[2] When Jesus called the disciples, God called them. When they followed Jesus, they followed God. In being so summoned and in following, they become the community whose beginning is not of the world but of God even if they are in it.[3] Through Christ they have come to know God and are thus taken out of the world because they are substantiated by the word of God incarnated in Christ whom they follow and from whom they received the word of God.[4] The disciples—the ones called to form this community—make up the community that is of Jesus thus of God and this belonging to Jesus is the unique source of the community and the unique essence of its presence in the cosmos. Thus, the community cannot be of the world because its source and foundation is not temporal but spiritual; it is literally born of the spiritual substance of the word of God that is Jesus Christ and is made to be God’s incarnate presence in the world but not of the world.[5] Therefore, to try to exist outside of this divine source and be in the world and of the world will render the fledgling community nothing but a social club.

Now, as the prayer goes on, the community so prayed for by Christ is to take up the mission of God in the world that was revealed in and through Jesus’s self-witness in the world; the community is, like it’s source and forebear, to call into question the things of the world, to challenge the domination of the kingdom of humanity.[6] This is the hardship for the disciples left behind by Jesus; they will be homeless in the world but by being thusly homeless they will find their home (their being and substance, their source) in God. Here, nothing of the world can comfort them or justify their existence; they are solely and completely dependent on the Word of God in Christ.[7] And in this way they are perpetually at risk for falling into the lure of the world, thus why Jesus prays for them. They must resist the urge, and they must abide in the vine.[8]

It is through remaining and abiding in and with the vine (ch. 15), clinging to the Word of God, and being recipients of the divine, life-giving sap that is the fulfillment of the joy of Christ that is made complete in the community left behind.[9] The holiness (the consecration, the sanctifying) of the community is found in ὁ λόγος ὁ σὸς ἀλήθείᾳ έστιν (v. 17b). The identity of the community in the world is formed by the word of God that is truth; thus, it is not defined by the word of the world that is not truth. Anything apart from this word, for this community, disempowers its presence and leads it astray from the source of its life and identity and renders it merely pruned kindling; the holy community cannot depend on anything but the word of God for its love, life, and liberation in the world for the world.[10] From here and only from here anchored in the Word of God, like Jesus, can the community of Christ take up God’s divine proclamation of life, mission of love, and revolution of liberation in the world.[11]

Conclusion

Our hope as the church visible today is not to forget the source of the life of the invisible church. Now is the time to push more into the Word of God, to recall and retell the stories of Christ and the radical divine action made known through him. It is in pressing into this identity as the holy community formed and founded on the radical proclamation of God’s Word incarnate that is how we find ourselves further in the world though never of it. To press into God and God’s word is not to go backwards to some archaic time or to cling to legalism or fundamentalism; this is death because God’s word is living and breathing, not something of a year now long gone (this is to live under the kingdom of humanity). To press into God’s word and God is to press into life and movement forward into something new, different, and something that can summon the world to look up and forward (this is to live under the reign of God).

As tempting as it may seem at times to jettison this ancient and rather whacky proclamation for one a bit more tolerable to the world, I assure you that is the surest way to forfeit our identity as the Christian church in the world and give up our seat in this history. Without the foundation of the Word of God in Christ, we no longer have a unique message to bring into the world and will just blend into the background of the world’s cacophony. We cannot depend on our doctrines and institutions, some claim to God’s law, or some static conception of God of another era; recourse to this language is just the same as the world’s language…it’s recourse to temporal things that have no part in establishing spiritual realities. It is to try to grasp at dust returned to dust.

Rather as part of this long-ago prayed for community, we must hear the divine summons, dare to let go of the rope, and fall deeper into God. We must let ourselves become consumed with God’s passion for the world, for the beloved. It’s in this full dependence on God and God’s word that brings us in line with God and begins to spark the flames of divine revolution in our midst; reformation (revolution) always starts in God’s church with God’s word. In this we can join our voices to the celestial symphony and demand life where there is death, love where there is indifference, and liberation where there is captivity in the name of Christ to the glory of God.

[1] Rudolf Bultmann, The Gospel of John: A Commentary, trans. GR Beasley-Murray, Gen Ed, RWN Hoare and JK Riches (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1971), 498. Originally published as, Das Evangelium des Johannes (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1964, 1966). “For the evangelist—and for the source too—the imparting of the name of God is not the transmitting of a secret, power-laden word, such as in the mysteries, or in the soul’s heavenward journey, or in magic, take effect by being spoken; rather it is the disclosure of God himself, the disclosure of the ἀλήθεια.”

[2] Bultmann, The Gospel of John, 498. “In the work that Jesus does, God himself is at work, in him God himself is encountered.”

[3] Bultmann, The Gospel of John, 498. “…by [the disciples’] faith they testify that their origin does not lie in the world, but that from the very beginning they were God’s possessions. As those who preserver God’s word, mediated through the Revealer, they form the community for which he prays.”

[4] Bultmann, The Gospel of John, 499. “From this kind of faith grew the true knowledge, και ἔγνωσαν ἀληθῶς…, which in turn is the means whereby faith comes to itself, καὶ ἐπίστευσαν. For what is known and what is believed are in fact the same; ὅτι παρὰ σοῦ ἐξῆλθον and ὅτι σύ με ἀπέστειλας mean the same thing. And the meaning is this: to understand Jesus as the revealer and so to come to know God (v. 3). This therefore is the Christian community: a fellowship, which does not belong to the world, but is taken out of the world; one that owes its origin to God, and is established by the Revealer’s word, recognised as such in the light of the Passion. i.e.. in the light of rejection by the world; a fellowship, that is to say, which is established only by t the faith that recognises God in Jesus.”

[5] Bultmann, The Gospel of John, 500. “The community belongs to God only in so far as it belongs to Jesus; i.e. it has its origin in eternity only in so far as it holds fast to its origin in the eschatological event that is accomplished in Jesus. To say that it belongs to Jesus is significant only in that it thereby belongs to God (τὰ ἐμὰ πάντα σά έστιν) that it belongs to God becomes a fact only in in that it belongs to Jesus (τὰ σὰ ἐμά).”

[6] Bultmann, The Gospel of John, 501. “But what is he?  As the revealer of God he is the Judge of the world, through whom the world is called in question; and he has his δόξα in the community inasmuch as it too means judgement for the world, and that through it the world is called in question.”

[7] Bultmann, The Gospel of John, 501. “His δόξα cannot be seen at the present time like the glory of a Messiah. There is no way of point to it in the world, except paradoxically, in that the community which is a stranger to the world is also an offence to it. Thus the community cannot prove itself to the world. Nor can its members comfort themselves in the things they possess…”

[8] Bultmann, The Gospel of John, 502. “From what has gone before it is at once clear that the prayer for their protection is the prayer that the community which stands in the world be protected from falling back into the world’s hands, that it be kept pure in its unworldly existence.”

[9] Bultmann, The Gospel of John, 506. “To say that this joy is to be shared by the disciples πεπληρωμένη, is to say, as in 15:11, that the joy they have already received through him will be brought to its culmination; the significance of turning to him in faith is found in the believer’s life becoming complete as eschatological existence.”

[10] Bultmann, The Gospel of John, 509. “Marked off from the world, the community is to live in the world as holy community. But it can only enjoy this state of separation from the world in virtue of the revelation on which it is founded, which is nothing other than the word of God transmitted to it through Jesus. Hus its holiness is not due to its own quality, nor can it manufacture its differentiation from the world by itself, by its rite, its institution, or its particular way of lie; all this can only be a sign of its difference from the world, not a means of attaining it. [The community’s] holiness it therefore nothing permanent, like an inherited possession: holiness is only possible for the community by the continual realisation of tis world-annulling way of life, i.e.. by continual reference to the word that calls it out of the world, and to the truth that sets it free form the world.”

[11] Bultmann, The Gospel of John, 510. “The community has a task analogous to his, and rooted in it…But it does not take over this assault or the duty to win the world solely by embarking on missionary enterprises; it does so simply by its existence.”

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“Buried in the Past; Captive to What Was”: Christian Limitation

Psalm 107:1, 21-22 Give thanks to God, for God is good, and God’s mercy endures for ever… Let them give thanks to God for God’s mercy and the wonders God does…Let them offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving and tell of Abba God’s acts with shouts of joy.

Introduction

We’ve spent the last few weeks looking outside at the global, national, and local socio-political tumult, chaos, and turmoil. There are many fires burning right now, and not enough water to put them all out. Some of these problems are so big that it feels like that save divine intervention itself, nothing will stop the death and destruction or ease the fear and anger and bring peace. Maybe God should start over again…*cue the thunder…

With all that is going around us, we can become so caught up with the tumult, chaos, and turmoil that we forget that there’s more here than meets the eye. We can become caught up in feeling helpless, hopeless, pointless, and absorbed by our limitations; we can’t make it better so why bother. It’s here we, a Christian church, forget the rock on which our identity is founded on. God. God The Creator, God the Reconciler, God the Redeemer; God who is the source of divine revolution of love and harbinger of liberation unto life. The same God who creates something out of nothing; God who resurrects the dead into life. It is this God who is fundamentally the source of our life spiritual (visible and invisible) and of our life corporate (spiritual and temporal).

Yet, it is this God we are so quick to jettison and abandon with saccharine desires to “keep the church” or “make the church relevant.” We would rather adhere to institutional order than be oriented toward this radical divine entity eager to flip the cosmos right side up. We grow embarrassed of our awkward proclamations and let the abusers, the power hungry, and the narcissists tell us what we will and will not say. We seem eager to remain silent when Jesus, God’s Word incarnate, is highjacked for violent purposes, baptizing war and genocide, oppression and alienation in the name of our Triune Abba God. We’d rather cling to the rope of the status quo and just fit in than dare to let go and fall into God, become radical, and go against the grain.

In refusing to let go of the rope we find ourselves dangling from provokes our spiritual and existential exhaustion. If you feel spiritually fatigued, this is why. All we want to do (and are trying to do) is climb back up the rope; what if we went back just a few years when things were “normal” and everyone was still here and things were going just fine, wouldn’t that be better than this? We don’t need or want rebirth, we think to ourselves. We just want our old church back. We want to go back to when it didn’t hurt so much to come to church, when decisions were easy, when we could quietly be this church gathered together. There’s a pit in our collective stomach that yells and screams: Go back! Run back to what was! Go back to that shore that was once comfort! Go back to not knowing, go back to when it was easier, go back to when things were better…I don’t care where, just go back to where it’s safe to just live…

Human beings have a hard time fighting against this lure and seduction of the romanticized past; the more we fight the more stuck we become. We are buried in the past, captive to what was.

Numbers 21:4-9

And the Lord said to Moses, “Make a poisonous serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live.” So Moses made a serpent of bronze, and put it upon a pole; and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live.

We find ourselves in the book of Numbers, the fourth book of Torah that “…recounts memorable events of the Israelite wandering from Sinai, God’s mountain, to the plains of Moab, just opposite the promised land.”[1] The Israelites are still liberated from Egypt, still murmuring and grumbling, and still following God and Moses through the wilderness.[2] Our particular passage falls in the middle unit of Numbers, titled, “The Generation-long March in the Desert from Sinai to Moab.”[3] And this particular unit about the “Generation-long March in the Desert” demonstrates Israel’s “recurring cycle of murmuring and rebellion against the authority of God and Moses, by individuals or by the community as a whole.”[4] This “murmuring and rebellion” isn’t solely restricted to the people following God and Moses, but includes leaders like Aaron and Miriam—Moses’ sibling; it also include Moses himself demonstrating disloyalty to God.[5] Yet, when the murmuring and rebellion threatens to reach a fever pitch and provoke God’s beloved back to captivity, God acts and acts swiftly (e.g. the Tribe of Korah and Numbers 16).[6]

In our story, we find the Israelites fed up (again! [7]) with spontaneously generating quail, this weird coriander substance, and a lack of water. “There is no bread and no water, and we have come to loath this miserable food,” (aka Manna[8]) (v.5b).[9] God’s response? Snakes on a plain! These “snakes” were poisonous serpents with a burning bite.[10] Rightly, the people—watching “many Israelites” die because of the bites of the serpents—hie themselves to Moses. We sinned against God; intercede for us! Moses—mercifully—intercedes for them. God resolves the issue. Using God’s instrument of punishment, God tells Moses to make a seraph symbol and mount it high on a standard (v. 8). Moses does so, casting one of these serpents in bronze,[11] mounting it on a standard. Anyone who was bitten and looked up at this bronze snake was healed (v. 9). Israel, amid their dilemma and plight, are exhorted to look up at God rather than down at themselves; [12] it is not the snake that heals them, it is their right orientation toward God who is their source of love, life, and liberation. Through this bronze serpent on a pole, they are summoned to remember that God calls them to look to God and to follow God even when it means missing those creature comforts of way back when and following God into the unknown and uncomfortable. God heals Israel as they turn to God; God liberates Israel when Israel follows God.

Conclusion

God is not stuck in the past; God is not captive to what was. God summons and coaxes forward God’s beloved—all creation, from the teensiest, weensiest critter to the biggest, ziggest beast; from the ones that live deep in the oceanic abyss to the ones residing on the peakiest of mountains. God woos the beloved forward, into something NEW, into something new and of God because backward is the stuff of humanity that has long ago expired, gone sour, become septic. Liberation for Israel is not a liberation to go backward, which is a return to captivity. Rather, Israel is liberated to step forward into the unknown, dared to fall into the void of faith and God, knowing that they cannot achieve this depth of liberation and life and love apart from God. They cannot leave God in the past as if God is no longer a necessary hypothesis. For this group of people, God is the beginning and the end of their life, love and liberation…no matter how banal the food has become and how boring the water from a rock.

Beloved in Christ, we are currently in a similar plight. We are surrounded by global tumult, national chaos, and local turmoil—vicious, deadly snakes, nipping at ankles. Now is not the time to jettison God and forsake God’s word. God desires to beckon us forward out of what we know, away from what was, and to lift our heads to God’s self. To forsake any portion of the proclamation of Christ will be the nail in the coffin of the Christian church. When we forget our source of life, love, and liberation we will hand the entire story over to those who are determined to use it to bring death and destruction. If we are dead set on going backward, clinging to our comforts and ease, we will be unable to lift our head to gaze upon God’s standard fixed upon the cross, because we will be too focused on ourselves. We will miss the One who can bring and guide us toward healing, peace, mercy, grace, and justice; we will sell our identity and existence as church for a few pieces of silver. We must let faith lead us to let go of the rope and fall into God, fall into the impossible so that God may bear through us God’s divine possibility. We must each gaze up at God’s standard and sing,

O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be!
Let Thy goodness, like a fetter,
Bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.[13]

Beloved, God calls, may our ears perk up. God comforts, may our souls be soothed. God speaks, may our ears delight in comforting words. God comes, may we run to Abba God. God is doing a new thing in this man from Nazareth, Jesus, the beloved, in whom, by whom, and through whom we are being coaxed forward, released from the past and liberated from what was…

[1] Nili S. Fox, “Numbers,” The Jewish Study Bible Jewish Publication Society Tanakh Translation, eds. Adele Berlin and Marc Zvi Brettler (Oxford: OUP, 2004), 281.

[2] Fox, “Numbers,” 281. “Thus, Numbers continues the story begun in Exodus and continued in Leviticus of the escape from Egyptian servitude, the desert journey to Mount Sinai, the revelation at Sinai and giving of the law, and the building of the Tabernacle with instruction on its operation.”

[3] Fox, “Numbers,” 282.

[4] Fox, “Numbers,” 282.

[5] Fox, “Numbers,” 282.

[6] Fox, “Numbers,” 282.

[7] Fox, “Numbers,” 325. “Once again the people revolt against God and Moses.”

[8] Fox, “Numbers,” 326. “This miserable food refers to the manna.”

[9] Nili S. Fox, “Numbers,” The Jewish Study Bible Jewish Publication Society Tanakh Translation, eds. Adele Berlin and Marc Zvi Brettler (Oxford: OUP, 2004), 325. “This incident is the final recurrence of wilderness murmuring. Complaints again center around a lack of water and poor food.”

[10] Fox, “Numbers,” 326. “Seraph serpents, based on the verb, means ‘burning serpents,’ because of the poisonous bite.”

[11] Fox, “Numbers,” 325. A copper serpent more likely refers to one made of bronze, a copper-tin alloy.

[12] Fox, “Numbers,” 326. “Rabbinic interpreters were disturbed by the magical nature of this cure, and suggested that it was the glance of the afflicted to their father in heaven, rather than the snake, which effected the cure.”

[13] Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing

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Illuminated and Awakened

Psalm 90:15-17 Make us glad by the measure of the days that you afflicted us and the years in which we suffered adversity. Show your servants your works and your splendor to their children. May the graciousness of our God be upon us; prosper the work of our hands; prosper our handiwork.

Introduction

Have you gone from pitch dark to bright light? I’m guessing most of us have experienced such a thing. So, you know the pain of that experience. It’s just as painful as having very, very warm comforters yanked off your very, very toasty body in the middle of a winter’s night when the bedroom is real, real chilly. Going from one extreme (darkness, warmth) to another (brightness, cold), hurts, it’s uncomfortable, it’s also startling and fear inducing, soliciting one toward anger (especially at the person who dared to yank your warm blankets off suddenly).

So, I have some bad news: the encounter with God in the event of faith is kind of (read: exactly) going from pitch dark to bright light, or from very warm and comfortable to not so warm and very uncomfortable. You see, the gospel is God’s word of love made known to you in the pitch dark or deep in the recesses of your comforter-cocoon. It flips the light on and lets it shine into unaccustomed eyes; it yanks back the covers and summons the sleeping awake. There’s no dimmer switch on the gospel; there’s no gentle nudge to waken. When it comes to an encounter with God in the proclamation of God’s love for you made known in Christ, it’s a death—not a little bit dead but a full on and total death.

But, get this, I have some good news: where there is illuminating and awakening there is God, so there is love, there is life, and there is liberation. So, if God’s word made manifest in Christ is the word illuminating and summoning those who hear out of darkness and from under cocoons of comfortable, then those who hear are illuminated and summoned by God into God; accepted not rejected and have God’s divine love, life, and liberation to love, live, and liberate in the world by the power of the Holy Spirit.

1 Thessalonians 2:1-8

For you yourselves perceive, siblings, that our entrance to you has not come by being empty but suffering previously and being insulted—as you beheld in Philippi—we spoke boldly by our God to say to you the good news of God in many struggles. For our comfort [is] not out of deceit and not out of impurity and not in guile, but just as we have been put to the test by God to be trusted [with] the good news, in this way we speak not by means of pleasing human beings but for God the one who puts our hearts to the test.[1]

1 Thess. 2:1-4

Traditionally associated with being authored by Paul, this epistle is written to small churches in Thessalonica—think northern Greece, formerly known as Macedonia. While there’s debate about the authorship of all the letters including this one and its twin, this is not the place for that discussion (and I am not the scholar you are looking for). For now, we’ll just look at the message because it’s a good one; it’s an important one.

Paul—I’m going with tradition here for ease and flow—writes to the Thessalonians a letter of exhortation and encouragement, and some reporting. The letter is filled with references to what has been going on, threaded through with reminders to remain committed to God and the Gospel of Jesus Christ, to continue in the faith, to love one another deeply, and to wait expectantly for the return of Christ. The letter is basically a bold reminder to love as they have been loved. Meandering through the letter, though, are references to the difficulty Paul and his cohorts experience while proclaiming the good news in other territories. (Here, Paul specifically references Philippi.)

This difficulty is worth pointing out, for Paul, while discussing their presence with the Thessalonians. Why? Because even though the Gospel is good news, it isn’t always comfortable. It can be quite comforting to have good news, however this good news—the gospel, the Word of God, Jesus the Christ—isn’t always comfortable because a lot of the work of the gospel is about bringing the one who hears to its—the gospel’s—conclusion. The gospel’s conclusion is nearly (most likely 99.9999% of the time) in opposition to the way the world and the kingdom of humanity operates. In other words, the gospel is offensive especially to those who have grown quite comfortable cloaked in the bliss of the darkness of and snuggled deep within the cocoon of the status quo.

Paul writes further,

For not at any time did we come by words of fawning, just as you have perceived, and not by a pretense of avarice, God witnesses, and not by seeking glory from humanity or from you or from others (having weighty power being as apostles of Christ). But we came vulnerable into the midst of you, like a nurse cherishing her own children. In this way being caused to long for you we were well-pleased to give a share to you not only the good news of God but also of our own souls, because you became our beloved.

1 Thess. 2:5-8

As Paul moves through this portion, he articulates well that he and his group did not come in glory and power to please humans, but came vulnerably into the divine beloved’s midst because of their deep, abiding love for the Thessalonians. Paul proclaimed the gospel because he loves the Thessalonians and in proclaiming this good news, Paul shared not only the gospel but also of his own soul. And here in is the paradox of the gospel in that it illuminates and awakens the one who hears—which is hard to endure—it does so by also anchoring the one who hears in the yoke of love with the lover. The beloved is illuminated and awakened into acceptance and not rejection.

Conclusion

I know that there are very hard moments in the journey with God in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. It can feel painful to be suddenly thrust from the security of darkness into the blinding and piercing light; it can be scary to be yanked out of our warm cocoon of comfortability. Yet, when God is in the mix, when Christ is the one turning on the lights and pulling back the covers, you are being ushered into something even better: into the love of God bringing new life by the liberating word of love.

It’s not easy to be faced with the truth of the situation, but you do not face that situation alone, as if it all is now on you to figure out. God is with you for God called you into the light and summoned you out of sleep and into divine love to live a present tense, liberated existence in the world. So summoned and called, you—those who hear—are no longer held captive by narratives bringing death and not life, but you are liberated to call a thing what it is and to move forward and into hard situations without recourse to ignorance or denial, to turning those lights back off or pulling the comforter back over your head.

You are the Beloved; no matter what you are facing right now, you do not face it alone for God is with you, always and forever. You have hope, you have possibility, you have love, you have life, and you have liberation from captivity. And never forget, most of all you have each other and thus you have God in your midst.

[1] Translation mine unless otherwise noted

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Liberated and Devoted

Psalm 78:3-4 That which we have heard and known, and what our Elders have told us, we will not hide from their children. We will recount to generations to come the praiseworthy deeds and the power of God, and the wonderful works God has done.

Introduction

The paradox of faith is that it’s both private and public, it’s big and small, it’s dynamic and restrained, it’s orderly and chaotic, it’s strong and weak, it’s life and death, it’s liberation and devotion.

The journey through Romans collides into this paradoxical faith that refuses to be categorically defined by one set of rituals or dogmas; in fact, it suspends ritual’s and dogma’s feeble claim to define or contain it. The reason for this paradoxical substance is that faith reflects the substance of God: faith is from God and faith is for God and is directed (back) to God. Neither faith nor God can be confined to human assumptions and intellectual concoctions. With faith and God, every day is a new day—every day presents and offers God’s mercies that are ours by faith, and this day will not be like the last one or like the one that comes next. You wake up and you are thrust—once again—on to God in faith, trusting that God loves you today as God loved you yesterday and will love you tomorrow.

So, our activity from day to day is defined not so much by our schedules and lists—although those can be so helpful with daily demands—but by what may happen. We have no control how God will summon our faith to manifest as love in the world to the benefit of the neighbor. Maybe the day will be quiet as you care for creation—weed the garden, water the plants, walk the dog, pet the cat, make dinner, rest and relax. Or maybe the day will present with neighbors (literally) knocking on your door, a phone call summoning you, an email needing your complete presence, or a random encounter with a stranger at the store.

Paul has worked hard to demonstrate how we are to discipline our outer nature to come in alignment to our inner nature, where our deeds are in alignment to our faith. Thus ,these actions take on the genetic and chromosomal likeness of our faith: loving, life-giving, and liberating. Faith orients us to God but that is not all, faith orients us to God through our neighbor and to our neighbor through God.  And this liberating faith will manifest itself in loving devotion to the well-being of the neighbor. And this may even mean, says Paul:

Romans 14:1-12

Now, welcome the ones who are weak in faith, but not for the reasons of plotting judgments. Indeed, some people believe in eating all things; but the one who is weak eats vegetables. The one who eats must not treat with contempt the one who does not eat, and the one who does not eat must not judge the one who eats; for God welcomes [that person]. Are you, you the one who judges the household servant belonging to another? [They] stand or fall to their own Lord, but [they] will be made to stand for the Lord is able to make [them] stand.[1]

Rom. 14:1-4

At the end of the disciplined outer nature is a return to the inner nature: do not judge. Literally. Are you, you the one who judges the household servant belonging to another? It’s here where Paul unifies the believer as a whole person: we are justified by faith apart from works which makes us love our neighbor in word and deed thus we do not judge our neighbor by their works, for their inner nature is the thing that is in line with God (or not!). Thus, they will express themselves into the world as they are so lead and as they can handle according to their conscience.[2] So, welcome the neighbor in but not to force them to become more like you or to fight with them about how they are (self) expressing their faith in love. The only thing that is necessary is love (remember 13:8, the believer is to be indebted to the neighbor in love).[3]

Driving the point home, it’s not necessary everyone eat the same way, dress the same way, view the day the same way—all these things are liberated from condemnation.[4] The only thing essential and necessary is love, divine love for the beloved, calling the beloved unto God and into the well-being of the neighbor (mutually). In this way, the believer is freed up from two very exhausting things: judging and controlling the neighbor. Letting the inner nature, of the neighbor be that which is between them and God is to give your own attention to yourself. For those who feel comfortable and called to eat and dress in a certain way should do so without judgment—whether another person agrees with them. Ultimately, the Spirit is at work in the conscience of the neighbor, especially the ones who share in the faith.[5] Why spend so much energy trying to get everyone to look the same, eat the same, be the same…wouldn’t this fly in the face of the singularity in plurality that is at the heart of Abraham’s call to be the father of many nations? Not one, but many (remember Romans 4?); so, too, should each gathering of the beloved reflect plurality and multitude…

Paul rounds out the discussion by bringing it all back to Christ and the love of God.

For not one of us lives for themselves and no one dies for themselves. For if we live, we live to the Lord; if we die, we die to the Lord. Therefore, whether we live and we die, we are of the Lord. For to this [end] Christ died and lived, so that also he might be Lord of the dead and the living. Now, why do you, you judge your sibling? And why do you, you treat your sibling with contempt? For we are all placed beside the tribunal of God…

Rom. 14:8-10

The goal here is to live liberated in love with the fullness of life; but not just for you, for your neighbor, too. You are pleasing to God as you are right now; so, too, is your neighbor/sibling—whether they act like you or not. If you feel led and called to freely participate in this or that ritual, this or that tradition, this or that act of worship, to dress this or that way, or eat this or that, you are free to participate; but, says, Paul, do so freely and according to your conscience which is the divine location of encounter with God in the event of faith.[6] You are enveloped in the grace and mercy of God and not held hostage by your ability to conform to the status quo or another’s expectations, not even society’s expectations, not even parents’ expectations; you are free to be you to the glory of God and the well-being of your neighbor.[7]

Conclusion

Two words of caution by way of remembrance:

  1. Remember we don’t live for ourselves; we don’t live alone, work alone, exist alone; rather we are intimately and profoundly connected to others be it family (immediate and extended), to our neighbors, to others in society (work and play), and even connected to those who have transitioned into God before us by means of our remembering-love. The glorified self-autonomy perpetuated in the mythology of the post-modern and western conceptions of human existence must be captured and put to death. If not, liberation will take on isolating and divisive characteristics. This means that any notion of liberation that is for you and you alone is a lie; in Christ’s economy it is sin. Putting ourselves first and foremost is the number one way to miss the mark when it comes to divine love and the neighbor.
  2. And with this emphasis on the other and divine love, remember that our encounter with God in faith is a return of God’s love for you with love for God. To love another is to love whom they love (1 Jn 4:19-21[8]). As my mother loves me, she loves my children because I love them; as a mother, I love those whom my children love because I love my children and they love these. As it is with us who are so basic, so it is with God. God’s love for me is never to be used as a weapon to abuse or threaten my neighbor or to cause them neglect and isolation. It is always liberative love making itself known in devotion to the neighbor.

Luther, at the very beginning of his treatise on The Freedom of a Christian, writes,

A Christian person is a free lord above everything and subject to no one.
A Christian person is a devoted-peer servant of everything and subject to everyone.[9]

The Freedom of a Christian

This paradox expresses the thrust of Romans in the best way. The believer is absolutely and positively free—above everything—a queen and priestess. But in this true and real freedom, the believer is so free she can and will serve her neighbor. Liberation fosters devotion; freedom is oriented toward justice. For the truly liberated person is free to put herself aside, like Christ who, to quote Philippians,

…though he was in the form of God,
did not regard equality with God
as something to be exploited,
but emptied himself,
taking the form of a slave,
being born in human likeness.
And being found in human form,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to the point of death–
even death on a cross.

Phil. 2:6-8 NRSV

[1] Translation mine unless otherwise noted

[2] LW 25, 485. “…understanding the term ‘weak’ as referring to people who are overly careful or still superstitious in some respect, who think they ought to do what they really do not need to do.”

[3] LW 25, 486. “Thus the meaning of the apostle is that in the new law all things are free and. Nothing is necessary for those who believe in Christ, but love is sufficient for them, …”

[4] LW 25, 487. “For every day is a feast, all food is permitted, every place is sacred, every time is a time of fasting, every kind of apparel is allowed, all things are free, only that we observe moderation in their use and that love and the other things which the apostle teaches us be practiced.”

[5] LW 25, 492-493. “For the strong man has his own opinion and is moved by his own reasons, and likewise the weak by his…leave him in peace and let him be satisfied with his own motives (or to say it in more popular language) let him stand secure and immoveable in the directions of his own conscience.”

[6] LW 25, 495. “Thus the whole error in this idea is that we fail to consider that if we are pleasing to God, all of these things must be done not by the compulsion of necessity or by the drive of fear but in happiness and a completely free will.”

[7] LW 25, 499. “But the apostle has something special in mind in this verse, namely, that he wants each person to be content in his own mind, or as it is commonly phrased, in his own thinking, and not judge another man in his thinking, nor should the other spurn him in return, lest perhaps he who is weak in faith, having his own mind, thinking, or conscience, but being disturbed or offended at the ‘mind’ of another person, begin to act contrary to his own ‘mind’ and thus conclude one thing and do something else and so be at odds with. Himself.”

[8] The NRSVUE has “19 We love because he first loved us. 20 Those who say, “I love God,” and hate a brother or sister are liars, for those who do not love a brother or sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. 21 The commandment we have from him is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also.”

[9] WA 7, 21; LW 31, 344. Translation mine from the medieval high german

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Fracturing the Stagnant

Psalm 105:1-3 Give thanks to God and call upon God’s Name; make known God’s deeds among the peoples. Sing to God, sing praises to God, and speak of all God’s marvelous works. Glory in God’s holy Name; let the hearts of those who seek God rejoice.

Introduction

So far in chapter 8 of Romans, we’ve covered a few things:

8:1-11: We started the chapter learning “So then at this very time [there is] not one punishment following condemnation for those in Christ Jesus,”[1] (v.1). This is the controlling thought for the chapter. Those who love God because they have been loved by God need not fear the law and its ability to condemn because they trust God by faith and love God. The law is exposed as weak by our inability to do it because it only tells us “do this” and “don’t do that”, but it cannot cause us to do it. Also, we found out—during Good Friday—we broke the law by not listening and loving Christ—God incarnate—and by forcing the law to condemn an innocent man. Here, Paul told us, when we’re dead set on living according to the flesh then we will judge according to the flesh. Then Paul is quick to usher us out of our tombs into Easter life by reminding us that Pentecost happened, and God’s Spirit is in us and thus we walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit desiring the things of the Spirit which is the heart and mind of God. Effectually, Paul reminds that even though we sentenced Jesus because we were stuck in the flesh, God’s love knows no limits and cannot be hindered not even by death and in Christ’s resurrection God demonstrates that God’s love is always and forever and we’re exposed, but the twist is that we’re not pushed away and rejected. Rather, we’re exposed and ushered into God’s presence and accepted; this is true love, mercy, and grace. Then…

8:12-25: Paul builds up the mercy, grace, and love of God for us and exhorted us to live into our adoption by faith in Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit so that we live (in the world) as God’s own beloved children. Paul drew the line in the sand, “For if you are living according to the flesh, you intend to die; but if [you are living according to] the Spirit, you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live.” This is not about now reverting to the law and living according to condemnation, fear, threat, and self-induced purity and piety—this is returning to the “the spirit of slavery brought again into fear”. Rather, “you received a spirit of adoption by which we cry aloud: ‘Abba, Elder!’” Returning to a life where you’re in service to the law will enslave you to fear and condemnation, deny liberation, which is the product of God’s love and life in you given by God’s grace and mercy. So, Paul is not exhorting you to turn in and focus on your sins, rather you are to focus on things of life, love, liberation and bringing God close to those who think God can’t be close to them. Plus, Paul explains, if we return to law and fear, we will not run to God but away from God. Rather, we’re to run to God, cry out for Abba!, and have hope because hope is a byproduct of love.

So, Paul says further,

Romans 8:26-39

Now, in like manner the Spirit takes hold with us in our weakness; for we do not perceive what we should pray according to what is necessary but the same Spirit intercedes for inexpressible groaning…Now, we perceive that all things work together toward good for the ones who love God who are being called according to [God’s] purpose…Therefore what will we speak to these things? If God [is] on our behalf, who [is] against us? God who spared not God’s own son but committed him on our behalf, how [is it] absolutely out of the question that also with him God will give freely all things to us? …  in all these things we prevail mightily through the one who loved us. (Rom 8:26, 28, 31-32, 37)

Building from the discussion on God’s love for us and our love for God provoking hope that motivates us now, Paul speaks to the Spirit helping us to pray in our weakness—not perceiving how to pray rightly. In other words, we pray and the Spirit takes those sounds and words—the inexpressible groaning—and molds them into prayers coinciding with the Spirit of God—the same one who searches the heart and mind of the beloved. To pray, according to Paul, is to speak to God in alignment with the Spirit of God. This means an exposure and realignment to God and God’s Spirit—when we pray, we dare to allow God to shape our words and our hearts to reflect God’s love, life, and liberation—no matter what we pray for.[2] In this way as we pray, we find ourselves in the realm of the proclamation of Christ, are exposed and accepted, and brought further into God’s mercy and grace. Thus, we begin to pray aligned to Christ’s self-witness. This is not about bombarding the door to the divine thrown room with incessant heartless repetition of words; [3] rather, it’s about finding yourself before God praying for God’s will to be done on earth as it is in heaven—advocating for the neighbor. When we’re aligned to Christ, the Spirit takes hold of our desires and wishes and forms them in accordance with the will of God: divinely twisted prayers seeking and searching for life, love, and liberation for the entire cosmos.

Next, Paul dares to say, all things work together for good for those who love God. Now, this isn’t about having your entire life go well and comfortably. It’s also not about winning or always finding yourself on victory’s side. It’s not even about liking things that happen as if this good was for you (privatized salvation (God’s acceptance and presence); privatized blessing). Rather, this’s about God’s word of life, love, and liberation as the absolute last word, the absolute good (deprivatized salvation; deprivatized blessing). Conjoined to what came before—the Spirit taking hold with us in our weakness and forming our prayers because we lack perception—we gain the perception that every little action reaching toward life, love, and liberation even when things are a massive dumpster fire threatening cosmic existence, will work toward good, toward love, life and liberation. Here we have hope to see all things are possible with God.[4]

Then, Paul moves on to say affirming all things working together for those who love God, “If God is on our behalf, who is against us?” If God is the author of love, life, and liberation in general and specifically even when God committed God’s son on our behalf and we responded with judgment according to the flesh which led to the death of God’s son, then who or what can be against us? Who is bigger than God? What is more powerful than love? Hate? No, because hate gives way to love because it’s made of the same stuff in the negative. Indifference? It has no power but rather consumes power and love wins over indifference every time. What is bigger than life? Death? No, God demonstrated that not even death can conquer life. What is more profound than liberation? Nothing, because not even a bit of captivity will ever let you be you. And if God is the source of life, love, and liberation and God is on our behalf and we’re on God’s behalf, then should we return to a spirit of fear? Should we then return to the law to find our justification with God? Should we then intentionally miss the mark just because? Should we perpetuate death and destruction as if we’re saved from hell and that is all that matters? Should we roll over and declare everything is impossible? Μὴ γένοιτο! Anything is possible with God; herein does the good find its way, cutting through the muck and mire of humans dead set on the flesh and death.

Conclusion

Beloved, we’re exhorted by Paul in chapter 8 to press into the divine life that is with us, among us, and in us. We’re exhorted to live as those who trust God, as those who are inspired by the divine Spirit, as those who have been forgiven and who forgive, as those who can carry God’s mercy and grace forward into the world. We’re to pray as we’re led to pray—asking for God’s will to be done on earth as it is in heaven—and knowing that when we pray the Spirit intercedes for us, molding and shaping our hearts, minds, and bodies in accordance with that will. We do not need to pray perfectly or repetitively; only simply. In this way, as we move about the world, we become those who can bring God close to those who are pushed far off, rejected, declared unlovable, those still held hostage and captive by unjust systems and structures. We get to be the ones who declare by word and deed God’s life, love, and liberation, to represent Christ into the world today, to participate in the fracturing the stagnant “this is all there is” and resisting lethargy, declaring confidently and defiantly to a world set on death and fear, “No, there is more here than meets the eye, for all things are possible for God who works all things together for the good of all, the Beloved, whom God loves!!”

[1] Translation mine unless otherwise noted.

[2] LW 25, 365. “Hence it results that when we pray to God for something, whatever these things may be, and He hears our prayers and begins to give us what we wish, He gives in such a way that He contravenes all of our conceptions, that is our ideas, so that He may seem to us to be more offended after our prayers and to do less after we have asked than he did before. And He does all this because it is the nature of God first to destroy and tear down whatever is in us before He gives us His good things…”

[3] LW 25, 366. “These people [those who do not have this understanding of God and God’s will] trust in their own pious intention and presume that they are seeking, willing, and praying rightly and worthily for all things. Therefore when what they have thought of does not immediately come to them, they go to pieces and fall into despair, thinking that God either does not hear them or does not wish to grant their requests, when they should have hoped all the more confidently…”

[4] LW 25, 365. “And we’re capable of receiving His works and His counsels only when our own counsels have ceased and our works have stopped and we’re made purely passive before God, both with regard to our inner as well as our outward activity…Therefore when everything is hopeless for us and all things begin to go against our prayers and desires, then those unutterable groans begin…For unless the Spirit were helping, it would be impossible for us to bear this action of God by which He hears us and accomplishes what we pray for.”

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